Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a production system in which a plurality of production apparatuses are arranged adjacently, a method for controlling the same, and a production apparatus thereof.
Description of the Related Art
Recently, in the manufacturing industry, along with the increase of small-volume production of large varieties of products and shortening of production model life cycles, there are demands for production apparatuses constituting manufacturing lines that are configured to cope with variations of productions and changes of models. For example, there are ideas related to composing a manufacturing line with general-purpose robot cells, i.e., robot stations, having a standardized size, shape and interface for cooperating with adjacent devices, so as to cope with the variations of productions and changes of models. For example, an articulated robot may be used as a manipulator of the robot cells serving as the production apparatus, and as another example, an orthogonal robot composed of a combination of movement apparatuses so-called stages, or tables, may be used.
Cells, or stations, adopting the orthogonal robots can be implemented relatively easily and inexpensively compared to adopting the articulated robots, and standardization of a manufacturing line composed by arranging a plurality of orthogonal robots can be realized easily. For example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2016-193484 discloses a manufacturing line composed by arranging production apparatuses adopting the above-described type of orthogonal robots.
Further, in composing manufacturing lines by arranging a plurality of production apparatuses composed of cells, i.e., stations, adopting orthogonal robots, conveyance apparatuses that transfers workpieces among production apparatuses may be composed of rectilinear stages, i.e., tables, configured to move the workpiece linearly. In such stages, i.e., tables, control is performed to operate the conveyance apparatuses simultaneously in synchronization in the same direction, for example, to enter to or retreat from the space for transferring workpieces with an adjacent production apparatus.
However, the manufacturing line disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2016-193484 respectively ensures a position for retrieving the workpiece conveyed from the conveyance apparatus having performed the former processing step and a position for placing the workpiece having completed to the process performed in the apparatus of the present processing step. That is, a configuration is adopted in which the adjacent conveyance apparatuses are arranged at positional relationships so as not to interfere with one another. Therefore, the required space used for conveying components in each robot cell corresponds to a size of two workpieces or greater, and there was a drawback that a large space is required for conveying components.